Today we’d like to introduce you to Solomon Hyaes.
Hi Solomon, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?
When I was 13, I was attending Rancho Cucamonga Middle School (RCMS). I was in the 8th grade, and every day after school, I would go to a program called Think Together. Years later, I would actually end up working for Think Together before the pandemic, which makes that part of my story feel very full circle.
One day, a contest from The Voice came to our school and held a talent show—one competition for the boys and one for the girls. At the time, I had always wanted to sing and rap, but I had never really given it a true shot. I wanted to be a dancer and maybe even play football because my father was a legend in his city when he was coming up.
When I heard about the competition, I decided I would give it a try.
A few years earlier, when I was in elementary school, one of my favorite after-school teachers was leaving her position for another job. I asked her if I could sing “Just the Way You Are” by Bruno Mars in front of the whole class.
Did I do it? Yes.
Did I sing it with my back turned toward the wall, crying the entire time while the whole class did their best not to laugh?
100%.
Looking back, I think that was probably where my stage fright began. So, if you ask me, my first reference point for performing live was pretty traumatizing.
But that didn’t stop me.
I wrote a verse, came up with a hook, and went home. For six days, I worked on a song. I would sit in a tree in my apartment complex and write. I was determined to have something ready for the talent show.
The day of the talent show came, and I went up and performed my piece. I was scared. I faced the wall. I cried a little.
But this time, I sang. I rapped.
And to my surprise, instead of laughter, I was met with claps and cheers.
I ended up winning first place for the boys.
After that day, I began writing music under the name Blu_J.
When I graduated middle school and went into high school, I wrote raps almost every day. This was the beginning of what I consider my SoundCloud era.
I had been in drumline in middle school, so I knew how to make rhythms with my drumsticks and drum pad. At the time, SoundCloud gave you the option to record audio directly through the app. Since I didn’t have access to beats, I would make beats with my drumsticks and record myself rapping over them.
Eventually, I played some of my songs for my dad. He decided to talk to my uncle, Pudge55, about getting me some studio time at Green Drop Studios.
During my sophomore year, my dad would drive me to the studio. By that point, I had made enough of a name for myself at school that two kids who produced music started sending me beats. I would take my songs and those beats to the studio and begin figuring out what my sound was.
Then I would post the music on SoundCloud.
My dad would sometimes fall asleep while I was recording, but the fact that he was willing to drive me from San Bernardino to the San Fernando Valley just so his 16-year-old son could figure out his sound meant the world to me.
By my senior year, my dad wasn’t able to take me to the studio anymore. That’s when I became friends with a kid named Mendez, who was on my long jump team. He had a makeshift studio in his mom’s garage and would engineer my sessions.
I recorded a song called “WRONG,” where I expressed feeling like there was a missing piece in my heart and that something was wrong with me.
That song blew up at my school.
That was my first real experience of social success through music. I performed at a few schools and at my church back in Los Angeles. A lot of people were trying to help me develop as an artist.
After I graduated, my mom divorced my father, and I had to get a job to help my mom with the bills. I did many different things to make money.
Eventually, I got my driver’s license and my own car. I met a girl I really liked, and at some point, I moved out of my mom’s house and into my grandmother’s house. I slept on her couch while recording a series called Blustyles and posting it online, hoping I could build some kind of fan base.
I recorded music in my car and in my grandmother’s basement. I never really cared where I made music. I just wanted to make it because music was how I expressed what I was feeling in the moment.
I didn’t mind going hungry as long as I could record.
Eventually, my mom moved to Orange County and asked me to stay with her. The girl I was with and I eventually broke up, and I found myself working and recording music every day.
My mom let me stay in her garage, and I turned it into a bachelor pad and recording studio.
The friends I had made over the years through music would come over, and together we created some of the most beautiful pieces of art.
This was when I realized how much I loved collaboration.
We didn’t just make music. My mom’s house became a safe place where people could come hang out, create, and express themselves.
At this point, I was 22 years old.
Eventually, I met my now-wife on a dating app.
When I met her, she was one of the first people who wasn’t afraid to call me out on some of my strange habits and behaviors. Instead of pushing her away, it made me want to change. I slowly began to humble myself and started reading self-help books.
At the time, I had created a project called 210 Highway. Sonically and lyrically, it was some of the best work I had made up to that point, but it was also full of lust.
At first, that didn’t bother me.
Then I sent it to a close friend of mine, and he told me it sounded like “horny boy music.”
That stuck with me.
I started asking myself:
“What am I doing with my voice? Is this the kind of message I want to put into the world?”
While all of these changes were happening, I encountered the Gospel in the back of my work van during a shift.
The Gospel was simple:
God loves you.
We all sin, and our sin separates us from God.
Jesus came to earth, lived without sin, died on the cross for our sins, and rose from the dead.
Because of what Jesus did, you can be forgiven and have a relationship with God.
I grew up in church, so I was familiar with the teachings of the Bible. But when my parents divorced, my mom didn’t have the time to take us to church anymore. At some point, those teachings about how to love and live began to leave my heart.
But when I experienced God for myself that day in my van at work, something changed.
From that day forward, I began developing my own relationship with Him.
I started changing into a whole new person.
Things I used to be into no longer felt right in my heart. Naturally, the way I expressed myself began to change too.
I started making new music and decided to go by my government name:
Solomon Hayes.
A friend of mine once told me, “He probably gave you Blu_J so you wouldn’t mess up Solomon’s reputation.”
That stuck with me.
Since then, I’ve approached music with the intention of teaching, celebrating love, and continuing to be a storyteller.
A song I wrote called “Can’t Google Peace” became the first song I released under my name. It represented a shift in my subject matter, where I was headed, and ultimately, why I do what I do.
I’ve been going by my government name since 2023. Since then, I’ve released several bodies of work, performed all over California, and connected with people who have helped me continue developing as an artist.
Eventually, I acquired a manager who helped me release my newest and most successful project yet:
It Takes A Village.
And looking back at everything—from the scared 13-year-old kid facing the wall at a talent show, to the teenager recording in garages, to making music in cars and basements, to turning my mom’s garage into a studio, to discovering God in the back of a work van—I realize that none of it was wasted.
Every version of me was becoming the person I am today.
Solomon Hayes.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
The only struggles I will say that I dealt with was confusing my circumstances with identity.
As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
I am a proud story teller. Just the other day I wrote a song from the perspective of a flower hahaha. I grew up on sings like Today was good day by Ice Cube, Fats Car By Tracy Chapman, Young N***** by the game, 4 Your Eyez Only By Jcole.
I am most recognizable for songs like Locked Up, Can’t Google Peace, Blues Skies No Umbrellas and Lovejoyimagination .
The thing that sets me apart from this large people of artist is my ability to story tell vividly, when I perform I have this ability to make make comfortable and immerse them into the show. Lastly my attention to detail when it comes to making a body of work. When my name is Solomon up I try to make it very clear that I am a Album Artist who can make great songs with compromises the art is Album Making.
Is there anything else you’d like to share with our readers?
Growing is a choice. My story need to be viewed in the eyes of I made a choice to grow by the grace of God
Contact Info:
- Website: https://linktr.ee/Solomonhayes
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/solomon_hayes?igsi=cXkwZW5tamRueXlm&utm_source=qr
- LinkedIn: https://linktr.ee/Solomonhayes
- Youtube: https://youtube.com/@solomonhayes?si=KTXzH5HZR42gVk0z
- Soundcloud: https://on.soundcloud.com/eAyYGoHF7jjRdLp5MJ
- Other: https://open.spotify.com/artist/1S6H7JPXo00ErrYX8oc1xH?si=cRD90_umTJqeoNkGaUHkMg&utm_source=copy-link
